Poulter likes the odds as he races into contention to be Europe's No 1

Four players belonging to the same
swish country club in Orlando occupy the leading berths in the quest to
become Europe’s No 1 going into the final two events of the season.

Henrik Stenson, Graeme McDowell,
Justin Rose and Ian Poulter all live within a couple of par fives of one
another, so you can imagine there’s been plenty of friendly banter
flying about on the practice range.

High hopes: Ian Poulter has vowed to hunt down Henrik Stenson

At the centre of it has been the irrepressible Poulter, who took one look at Stenson’s mammoth lead and, as you can imagine, was left suitably undaunted.

‘I’m going to hunt you down,’ he told the Swede.

Naturally enough, a bet was struck, with Stenson so confident of victory he gave the Englishman odds of 10-1. Ah, Henrik. Did you forget Poulter’s whole career has been a triumph over monstrous odds? Poulter was hopelessly adrift in 15th place at the time but he’s up to fourth following a valiant defence of his HSBC Champions title yesterday.

‘I think those odds have come down a little now,’ said Poulter with a mischievous smile as he heads to Turkey this week with a glint in his eye.

The Englishman had 15 birdies and an eagle in the closing two rounds in Shanghai to finish runner-up behind an inspired Dustin Johnson.

Star-studded: Johnson acknowledges the crowd on the 8th, with half of Europe's Ryder Cup team on his tail

Embraced: Johnson is congratulated by his fiancee Paulina Gretzky at the Sheshan International Golf Club

‘I’m not really sure I could have done a lot more, so credit to Dustin,’ said Poulter (right).
Johnson couldn’t make the last Ryder Cup but there will be no leaving
him out of the next one at Gleneagles if he continues to turn in
displays like this. Here we had one of the great final days of the
golfing year and a display under pressure that was just stunning to
behold.

With six holes to go, the American had seen his overnight three-shot
lead disappear to the point where he was level with McDowell and trailed
Poulter by one.

The next four names on the leaderboard were Sergio Garcia, Justin Rose, Rory McIlroy and Martin Kaymer.

In other words, it was Johnson against half of Europe’s Ryder Cup team.

Johnson won by playing those holes: birdie, birdie, par, eagle, birdie,
par. The 27-year-old threw away the US Open that McDowell won in 2010,
tossed The Open the following year in the direction of Darren Clarke and
was robbed of a US PGA claimed by Kaymer owing to a horrible final-hole
rules decision. Here it was his turn against Europe’s finest with a
display so impressive he was well within his rights to declare: ‘I will
win a major if I keep playing like this.’

As for the Race to Dubai, with Stenson over-golfed and McDowell giving
this week’s event a miss, Rose and Poulter have the opportunity to
shorten the odds still further and set up a tense finale in the desert.

So the stage was set for a compelling afternoon, played out in front of
thousands of Chinese fans who turned up to create a carnival
atmosphere.

‘It feels
great to come out on top after such a battle,’ said Johnson. ‘It’s been
a long year, one where I haven’t won anywhere since the opening event
of the season. But I have put in a lot of hard work over the last month
or so and it certainly paid off here.’

Garcia, with a wonderful final round 63, snatched fourth place, two
strokes ahead of US Open Champion Rose with McIlroy finishing in a tie
for joint sixth, as he continues to edge back towards his best form.